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Andreas Schneider's avatar

The beauty of math is not to use as many words as possible but as little as possible. You are literally taking something that is supposed to create clarity and use it remove clarity. What you mean is simply:

1/2 + 1/3 + 1/9 = 0.9444 != 1

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ryan's avatar

I used to feel that using (x + y) - y during a proof was just some sort of cheap trick, that for example would never appear in The Book. But this is making me realize that since the -y part tends to stick around, what you're really doing is just revealing this inevitable residual.

Also makes me wonder how you can derive quadratic formula without completing the square.

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